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Taiwan’s implementation of Hanyu Pinyin to be limited, gradual

The Ministry of Education’s National Languages Committee on Wednesday issued very general guidelines for how Taiwan will go about implementing Hanyu Pinyin.

Unfortunately, they’re not very clear. But long years of experience have taught me that the most pessimistic interpretation (from the standpoint of Pinyin advocates) is probably the correct one. One guideline, for example, states:

Guónèi dìmíng sh? guójì t?ngyòng huò yu?dìngsúchéng zh?, wúx? g?ngg?i.
(Dometic place names that are internationally known or established by convention need not change.)

That’s going to be the excuse used to justify keeping all too many names in bastardized Wade-Giles or other largely useless systems. Thus, we’re probably stuck with not just old forms of names of big cities and counties (e.g., Kaohsiung and Taichung rather than Gaoxiong and Taizhong) but also old forms of lesser-known cities and counties (e.g., Taitung and Keelung rather than Taidong and Jilong). If this is the extent of things, it would copy the policy that the previous administration applied, which I think would be a terrible mistake.

Of course, there’s also the possibility that this will be used an excuse to keep even more old forms than the DPP’s Tongyong policy did, e.g., Panchiao and Hsintien rather than Banqiao and Xindian (or Tongyong’s Banciao and Sindian). In which case the expression might better be, “Taiwan’s romanization situation: one step forward, two steps back.”

4 thoughts on “Taiwan’s implementation of Hanyu Pinyin to be limited, gradual”

Readers should consider paying the committee a visit. Exit 5 of
Shandaosi MRT stop. ?????????172?2?http://www.edu.tw/MANDR/INDEX.ASPX tell them to convey your feelings about “Hsinchu”, “Kaohsiung”, etc. to those really in charge.

It is even more important to get rid of the rule that cities and counties’ names use old pinyin, whilst towns and villages use the new pinyin, before the eve of the large amount of new addresses generated by the unification of Taiwan’s cities and counties. Dump half and half. Finally use a standard.